Nobody paid much attention to the man with the backpack, as he approached the entrance to a beige-coloured Monaco apartment building. It was 9pm, Monday. The street – rue Révérend-Père-Louis-Frolla – is located in a quiet hillside part of the wealthy principality, close to the border with France.
The man left his bag on the front steps. Soon afterwards, the Ukrainian-born oligarch Vadym Iermolaiev emerged, together with his wife and their 13-year-old child. There was an explosion and CCTV captured an image of the suspect, wearing a black jacket and a bucket hat, running from the scene towards the neighbouring French town of Beausoleil.
All three victims were injured and taken to hospital. According to reports, the oligarch’s wife was critically hurt. As European police searched for the bomber, the unanswered question was why someone wanted to kill Iermolaiev, one of Ukraine’s richest businessmen, with a fortune estimated at $225m (£170m).
Iermolaiev is a real estate developer who was born and raised in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro. His company, the Alef Group, also has interests in agriculture and vodka production. In 2018 the oligarch gave up his Ukrainian passport and acquired EU citizenship from Cyprus. As well as Monaco, he is a frequent visitor to London and Paris.
In 2022, the newspaper Ukrainskaya Pravda identified the oligarch as a member of the “Monaco battalion”, an ironic reference to wealthy Ukrainians who live in comfort abroad while their fellow citizens experience daily Russian drone and missile attacks. Iermolaiev enjoyed the high life and drove a £250,000 Bentley Flying Spur, it noted.
The following year, Ukraine imposed personal sanctions on Iermolaiev after an investigation by the country’s SBU security agency. It said the 58-year-old oligarch continued to trade alcohol in occupied Crimea and paid millions of dollars in taxes to the Russian treasury. His assets were frozen and he was prohibited from doing business.
In an interview with Ukrainian media, Iermolaiev strongly denied the allegations, calling them “completely surreal”. He claimed Russia seized his grape growing and cognac enterprise in Crimea when it annexed the peninsula in 2014. “We lost everything,” he said, adding that he had hired a team of lawyers to get the sanctions against him lifted.
The oligarch condemned Russia’s invasion and said a missile strike on Dnipro airport had destroyed his private plane. Chechen militants stole his agricultural machinery, he added. “I despise our enemies and believe that they will bear responsibility for the grief they brought to Ukrainian land and to my hometown,” he told RBK Media, saying he gave money to Ukraine’s armed forces.
Several sources on Tuesday dismissed the idea the audacious attack in Monaco could have been carried out by Ukraine’s special services. “He’s an opportunist, not an open enemy,” one remarked. Another described him as someone with “no ideology” and “zero political views” who could not “by definition be a Russian asset”.
“He isn’t a political person,” somebody who knew him socially said. “He’s a businessman. Vadym is nicer than 95% of people on that level … He’s always smiling and pleasant to be around, a typical Dnipro Jew. He likes life, tells endless jokes and speaks in a rather stumbling manner.”
A more plausible explanation for Monday evening’s bomb attack might be claims that the oligarch was connected to an alleged call centre scam, the sources said. They added: “It looks like something very, very personal. There are security cameras on every street corner in Monaco. That’s why rich people feel safe there. The hit doesn’t seem to be the work of a top professional.”
Late last year, Iermolaiev’s son, Artur, was detained in Cyprus at the request of Interpol and subsequently extradited to Estonia. There, he was accused of creating a criminal organisation engaged in telephone fraud. According to Estonian investigators, Iermolaiev Jr, along with three other defendants, created fraudulent call centres in Ukraine that “offered fictitious investment opportunities”.
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As a result, between 2019 and 2022, the defendants received over €100m, €5.4m of which came from Estonian residents. Iermolaiev Jr entered into a plea bargain, received a suspended sentence, paid €8.5m and left Estonia shortly afterwards, the media outlet Meduza reported. He is now banned from entering Estonia.
Chechen criminals are known to be behind many call centre scams, which have led to thousands of Russian pensioners being defrauded of their savings. In March suspected Chechen gangsters kidnapped the sons of two prominent businessmen from Dnipro, while they were on holiday in Bali. The body of one of them, 28-year-old Igor Komarov, was found chopped up on a beach.
According to Ukrainian media, Komarov admitted his role in the fraudulent call centre business. Before killing him, his captors demanded a $10m ransom. His friend managed to escape. Ukraine’s main police investigation unit opened a case into Komarov’s murder and kidnapping, together with their Indonesian counterparts.
A Chechen connection to the Monaco bombing is so far unproven. Sources who know the low-profile oligarch say he is someone who typically tries to avoid conflict, especially with government, and prefers to settle disputes by making backroom deals. In 2024 he transferred some of his assets to his 21-year-old daughter, Sofia, who lives in London and Cyprus, according to the Ukrainian media outlet Hromadske.
Whoever the perpetrator, other members of the “Monaco battalion” are likely to be decidedly more nervous in future. “Everyone is in shock,” one regular Ukrainian visitor to the principality admitted. They added: “Vadym is a very nice man. The TV screens and cameras didn’t protect him.”